Sri Lanka appears to be entering a dangerous phase where the country repeatedly discovers major institutional failures only after the damage has already occurred. The pattern is becoming impossible to ignore. Every few weeks another revelation emerges involving missing money, collapsed oversight, regulatory silence or public explanations that somehow create more questions than answers.
The disclosure by NDB Bank of a reported fraud amounting to approximately 13.2 billion rupees may well become one of the defining governance questions of this period. Not merely because of the size of the alleged fraud itself, but because of what it potentially says about the systems surrounding it. Sri Lanka’s banking structure is not supposed to operate on trust alone. Modern banks are layered institutions. They possess internal controls, compliance divisions, internal auditors, external auditors, board audit committees and regulatory supervision. These structures exist precisely to identify anomalies before they become catastrophes. That is the entire point of corporate governance.
Which is why the public is entitled to ask a simple but profoundly uncomfortable question: if the numbers were there, why were the alarms apparently not?
The same concern now extends beyond the banking sector. The reported diversion or “hacking” involving USD 2.5 million linked to the Ministry of Finance has generated similar anxieties. Public funds reportedly intended for debt servicing do not ordinarily vanish into unknown accounts without procedural failure somewhere along the line. The issue is not simply cybercrime. Every major financial system in the world faces cyber threats. The real issue is whether safeguards, authorisations, verifications and institutional vigilance were exercised at the level the public has a right to expect from those entrusted with national finances.
Then came the extraordinary revelation – soon after the NPP came into power – involving the release of 323 containers without examination. Once again, the country found itself confronted not merely with the incident itself, but with a broader question regarding systems, accountability and institutional culture. How do such events occur inside structures supposedly designed around layered approvals and oversight? At what point does the issue stop being about individual lapses and become instead a systemic governance problem?
Even the coal controversy increasingly appears to reflect the same deeper national illness. Rather than confronting the immediate question of responsibility over the importation of allegedly substandard coal, parts of the debate have shifted toward attempts to pull historical purchases and previous governments into the argument. Certainly, prior wrongdoing – if any existed – should also be examined. But historical allegations do not erase present fiduciary obligations. One possible failure does not legally or morally sterilize another.
The law is the law is the law.
No matter who governs. No matter who governed before. No matter what political slogan carried a government into office.
This is precisely where fiduciary duty becomes central to the national conversation. Fiduciary responsibility is not a ceremonial phrase inserted into annual reports and speeches for decorative purposes. It is the obligation imposed upon individuals entrusted with authority to act carefully, competently and in the best interests of the institution and ultimately the public itself. Directors owe it. Regulators owe it. Public officials owe it. Auditors owe it. Ministers owe it.
And the public – including the millions who voted for the National People’s Power and the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna – possess an entirely legitimate democratic expectation that the people entrusted with power will exercise that responsibility diligently and honestly.
This is why even the increasingly emotional debate surrounding Ranil Wickremesinghe and Wolverhampton risks missing the larger issue if it descends purely into political vengeance narratives. Sri Lanka’s national interest cannot become subordinate to endless cycles of selective outrage, tribal score-settling or partisan theatre. Accountability matters. But accountability must remain rooted in national interest, legality and institutional integrity rather than political spectacle alone.
Because beneath all these controversies lies a far more dangerous possibility.
That Sri Lanka is slowly normalising institutional failure itself.
That oversight increasingly awakens only after catastrophe.
That responsibility has become reactive instead of preventative.
And that fiduciary duty – the very principle upon which governance, banking and public administration are meant to rest – has quietly taken leave.
If that perception hardens within the public mind, the consequences will extend far beyond one bank, one ministry or one scandal.
Confidence itself begins to erode.
And once a country loses confidence in its institutions, rebuilding it becomes infinitely harder than any audit, investigation or press conference that follows.
